Question

What are nursing standards that a student must learn and develop to keep patients safe? What can a student nurse do to develop skills used in nursing to keep patients safe? What are some nursing standards implemented for patient safety?

What can a student nurse do to develop skills of checking a patients orientation or identity?

Answer 1

In order to improve the patient safety, the nursing students have to know about the risk factors that negatively affect patient's safety, which can be healthcare related or personal information.

For example, improving the accuracy of patient identification is one of the effective ways to improve the patient safety by preventing the misidentification of the patient. Wrong patient identification affects all stages of diagnosis and treatment. Generally, the patient's name, phone number, identity card are used as patient identifiers. Using the digital identification system such as bar coding or fingerprints helps to improve the accuracy of patient identification. Appropriate labeling of the specimens, using the electronic medical records also avoid mistakes in patient identification.

Also, a nurse student must know about various types of hazards possible at the medical facility and the way of preventing the hazards. Knowing about the safety rules of patient's information (patient confidentiality) is also important for a nurse student to avoid the legal issues and protect the patient information.